Sheriff's association endorses Alkire for District Attorney

Related Media

The Nevada County Deputy Sheriff’s Association announced its support Tuesday for the election of David Alkire as Nevada County District Attorney.

“After hearing presentations and taking candidate interviews, the DSA voted to endorse your candidacy based upon your experience and qualifications,” Association President Timothy Highsmith wrote in a letter to Alkire announcing its endorsement. “Your leadership, personal integrity and solutions to effectively and professionally represent the people as District Attorney make you the best candidate for the office.”

Alkire announced his decision in early January to become a candidate for District Attorney in the June election, running against incumbent Cliff Newell. He has already been endorsed by the Deputy District Attorney and Deputy Public Defender Public Employee Association, the bargaining unit that represents all of the county’s deputy district attorneys and deputy public defenders.

Alkire has stressed a platform of restoring “personal integrity and professionalism to the leadership” of the DA’s office.

He is touting more than 30 years of experience in private practice as defense counsel, as well as more than 10 years of experience as a deputy district attorney in Los Angeles and Monterey counties, prosecuting a broad range of violent and serious felonies, including capital murder, criminal street gangs, residential burglaries and assaults with firearms.

“I am pleased to earn the trust and support of the Deputy Sheriff’s Association,” Alkire said in a prepared statement. “Clearly, my message resonates with officers frustrated over the lack of consequences for committing crimes in Nevada County.”

Alkire called the endorsement a “very big deal,” adding that receiving endorsements this early — even before the filing period for candidates closes Friday — is important because so many residents of Nevada County vote absentee, sending in their ballots more than a month before the June election.

“It’s an extraordinary thing, that a challenger got these endorsements,” he said. “This association includes the bailiffs who are in court every day. The fact they are seeing performance of the incumbent, and choosing to endorse his challenger is very important.”

Alkire said he has been talking to every association of law enforcement officers in Nevada County, as well as going on ride-alongs.

“Their observations on the problems with current leadership are quite strongly felt,” he said. “There is a major issue with the revolving door as it relates to certain perpetrators who are arrested, released and arrested, over and over again. I have seen this very recently with a couple of persons … who are simply not being held accountable for the fact that they continue to victimize the people of Nevada County.”